Generally, a refrigerator includes a foam insulation material filled to form an insulation layer between an inner liner constituting an inner wall of a storage room and an outer liner constituting an outer wall of a body, and a wire harness provided through the insulation layer, through which several electric and electronic components of the refrigerator, including various sensors and switches, are electrically connected to a controller or a power source.
The inner liner is often equipped with a fixing device to support the wire harness thereto. The wire harness can be connected to the controller or the power source. With one end thereof inserted in the inner liner, the fixing device is held by the foam insulation material between the outer and inner liners.
Such a conventional wire harness fixing device includes a housing, which has one end inserted into a fixing hole formed in the inner liner and allows electric lines or wires provided between the inner and outer liners to pass through the housing, and a housing cover, which typically has a shielding portion that surrounds the housing for shielding the fixing hole to prevent leakage of the foam insulation.
However, with such a conventional wire harness fixing device, the foam insulation material can easily leak to the outside of the inner liner through gaps between the housing and the housing cover or through gaps between the shielding portion and the inner liner, which are separately provided, when filling the space between the inner and outer liners with the foam insulation material. Thus, in order to prevent leakage of the foam insulation material, tapes or adhesives, such as hot-melt, are used to seal the gaps between the housing and the housing cover or the gap between the shielding portion and the inner liner. A resilient holder is often mounted to an outer surface of the housing cover to force the housing cover into close contact with the housing. As such, conventional wire harness fixing devices are difficult to assemble and install due to the adhesives and the resilient holder.